There was a time, not terribly long ago, when parents didn't know anything about their baby until the child was born.

There was no prenatal genetic testing, no ultra-tech ultrasound, these same parents to be probably

bought whatever baby gear seemed reasonable from a local store or borrowed from a friend. There

were no vast online communities to compare pregnancy notes or organize baby meetups. These parents

might have had friends with babies. They possibly read a baby advice book, but for the most part,

their pregnancy and parenting experiences were their own. But the age of the smartphone has birthed an entirely different childbearing experience. From KERA in Dallas, this is Think. I'm

Courtney Collins in for Chris Boyd. Technology has ushered in a lot of good for parents and kids. Medical advances, safe,

sleep practices, the ability to meet other people with babies. But the internet in our pocket

also means parents and parents to be are constantly inundated with information. Some of it helpful,

some of it downright harmful, about the vulnerable experiences of pregnancy, birth, and child raising.

Amanda Hess, critic at large for The New York Times, writes about this in her new book.

It's called Second Life, having a child in the digital age, and she joins us now to talk about it.

Amanda, welcome back to think.

Thank you so much for having me.

So as a parent of young kids myself, I found this book very relatable.

I definitely have fallen down a lot of the same rabbit holes that you explore for second life.

I'm hoping you're going to share a little bit about your first pregnancy, which is at the heart of the book.

But before you do, can you please share the inspiration for the pseudonyms you use for your kids?

Yeah. So there's a website that I think is AI generated that compiles little mini-biographies of

not very famous people. So maybe like local pastors and journalists. And I came across a biography for me at some

point that said that I had one boy, a child whose boy, and his name was Alma. And that's not his

name. But that is the name that I chose to use for him in the book because

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